Play Games 24X7 Private Limited, a Mumbai-based online gaming company, has approached the Madras High Court, seeking the quashing of a notice issued to it by the Crime Branch-Criminal Investigation Department (CB-CID). The agency had sought details regarding the investigation into the case of an online rummy player having died by suicide after killing his wife and two children in Chennai last year due to mounting debts.
Justice G. Chandrasekharan on Friday refused to grant any interim relief to the company without hearing the prosecution. After hearing senior counsel C. Manishankar and Satish Parasaran for the company, he directed Government Advocate S. Santhosh to ensure that a counter-affidavit was filed by Tuesday to the writ petition challenging the notice issued on March 2, seeking answers to a total of 26 queries.
The investigating agency wanted the gaming company to furnish its bank statements; the play history of the deceased, D. Manikandan, 36, who was serving in a top position at a private bank before committing the crime; details of tax deducted at source with respect to the money won by the player; details of games played by him with the computer-controlled character BOT; and whether a bonus was paid to the player.
Issuing the notice under Section 91 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, the CB-CID (Chennai Metro Circle) had also sought details of every game played by Manikandan, and details (such as User ID, Know Your Customer, Aadhaar number, PAN card number, phone number and bank account) of other players who had played against him. The agency also sought to know what the company’s turnover was since 2016, and the pattern of its operations.
Assailing such a notice, the company, in its affidavit, contended that the police could not be allowed to conduct a roving inquiry and go on a fishing expedition with a predetermined aim to implicate it in the case, which was initially registered under Section 174 (police to inquire into a case of suicide) of the Cr.PC, but was altered to Section 302 (murder) of the IPC, besides being transferred from the city police to the CB-CID.
“lt is evident that the respondents are abusing their powers in order to foist a case against the petitioner, that is ex-facie absurd and untenable, with a view to achieve indirectly what the State has hitherto failed to achieve directly, viz ‘the total ban of the online gaming involving pure or substantive skill.’ That a game of rummy is a game of skill and is within the bounds of law has been emphatically laid down by the Supreme Court,” the company argued.
The petitioner said it operated a website, www.rummycircle.com, apart from two mobile applications – my11circle and rummy circle – by employing 750 full-time employees at its offices in Mumbai and Bengaluru. The deceased had last played on rummy circle on April 6, 2017, and did not utilise the platform for almost five years, before he died by suicide on January 2, 2022.
Another petition
Filing one more writ petition challenging a similar notice issued to it by the CB-CID, seeking details with respect to the suicide of another player, R. Raghuvaran, 27, of Chennai in April 2022, the company cited similar grounds to get the notice quashed. “So many people die due to liquor. Will the police register a case against Tasmac on the charge of abetment of suicide?” Mr. Parasaran asked, while arguing the second case.
To this, the judge replied that easy accessibility was the problem with online games. “One has to go to a shop for purchasing liquor, whereas online games are available at the touch of a button anywhere and everywhere. Anyway, let us look into the matter after the filing of the counter-affidavits,” he said, and asked the Government Advocate to ensure that the counters were filed in both the writ petitions by Tuesday.
(Assistance for overcoming suicidal thoughts is available on the State’s health helpline 104, Tele-MANAS 14416, and Sneha’s Suicide Prevention Helpline 044-24640050).
